cutie and the boxer

This story is part of True/False Conversations, a series of in-depth interviews with the filmmakers of this year’s True/False Festival. Find the rest of them here or download the podcast on iTunes.

Ushio Shinohara was a “rowdy, confrontational" young artist, seemed destined for fame after moving to New York City in the late 1960’s. He hung out with Warhol. He’d been part of Japan’s post-war avant-garde movement, most well-known as the “boxing painter,” for his exhibitionist art where he would dip his cloth-bound hands in ink, and punch his way down a canvas. But his full potential was never realized.